Olympic Dreams

With the end of the Beijing Olympics (yes I know it ended some time back), there are those that are reveling in the pseudo-national pride that comes with your nation performing, however lack luster, at the big event; ecstatic at our performances in shooting, wrestling and boxing, Indian sports fans and the above mentioned pseudo-patriots are going crazy with accolades. At the other end of the spectrum there are the critics that either can’t/won’t take anything positive from it or are just inclined to finding the cloud that carries the silver lining.

The medal trio is enjoying the adulation being poured in on them, while the other athletes either disappear into obscurity or get back to training for the next event of their season. But that sounds just like the India I left two years back, where effort goes unnoticed, hard work and dedication sidelined by the Indian publics need for instant gratification.

But let us leave them for the moment and concentrate on our critics. Just 3 medals from a billion strong? Or how about the fact that countries the size of Estonia, or ones with political strife like Zimbabwe manage to win more medals than us?

"We are the world’s biggest democracy, the second most populous country in the world. Then why is that in a span of 4 years, we are only able to produce 57 top athletes?"
Source: http://www.iwebie.com/indias-2008-beijing-olympics-dreams

But these comparisons are simplistic. Canada, the second largest country finished just 19^th, and Indonesia, with the 4^th largest population did worse than the aforementioned politically handicapped nation. This just goes to prove, your size, population or wealth has no bearing on how well you will do at the Olympics or any large sporting event for that matter.

"This is a matter of national shame, an aspect that the Indian Govt. needs to look at closely."
Source: http://www.iwebie.com/indias-2008-beijing-olympics-dreams

This sentiment is highly reflective of Indian behavior, our need to shirk off responsibility and redirect blame. It isn’t the government that is to blame. It is the Indian public. A nation, taking a crap on Rathore, without even knowing what the reason for his poor performance might have been. And even if there is no reason, I believe our medal winners (and prospects) deserve a little more respect than they are currently being shown

But what irks me more than everything else Indians do is the fact that some of these critics aren’t too appreciative of the fact that our medal winners are getting the attention that they are currently receiving.

"Now lets move our focus towards the sportsmen themselves. Vijender Kumar has already started talking in terms of modeling. Sushil Kumar seems to be completely over the moon. Its obvious that these people have started losing their focus even before their actual journey has commenced. At a time when they should start concentrating on the Commonwealth Games, India's so called medal winners are everywhere except for where they should be."
Source: http://www.intheorbit.com

Note: They are not “so-called” winners.

Well, it is alright when those douche bags get coke and Pepsi deals, isn’t it? I find nothing wrong with the Indian sportsmen and women cashing in on their newfound and (possibly) short lived fame due to their “so-called” Olympic triumphs. After all we are a fickle nation with no regard for our sports heroes. Maybe you will remember some of our athletes that had to sell their medals¹ from other events in order to survive. Or maybe you do not. But that is our nature. And it is this nature that has dawned on these three men and they deserve to make the best of what they have now. May they never have to worry about selling their hard earned medals.

But all this begs the question, who is to blame; when our system rewards performances after results and provides no impetus (different from incentives) for our athletes (cricketers aren't athletes in my opinion). I don’t have the answer, and I don’t think Indians really care either. The question will be put on the back burner until a few months before the 2012 Olympics.

But all this doesn’t hold a candle to the final and most absurd accusation, one that pisses me off so much that I believe that anyone that dare make such an accusation deserves castration; and that is for the lack of time to construct an appropriate torture that matches the blasphemy. It is said that the reason we had so many ‘flakers’ these Olympics was due to the fact that they lack passion. To those cricket loving douche bags that know not true passion when they see it, I hope you rot in the world’s dirtiest cesspool

I don’t see how they can levy this accusation, with reasonable seriousness, when our sportsmen who toil in their respective sports even though the chances of any glory are minimal, even if they do bring in the results (Karnam Malleswari won a few lakhs for her bronze and some Arjuna Award or some titular facade). Most of them toil in their sports into obscurity. Few have heard of the gallant sportsmen who fight so that we may one day have an Abhinav Bindra or an Akhil Kumar.

India doesn’t deserve the medals these young men and women bring in. And while I will be hurt if we continue to perform as we have in the past, I believe the Indian nation deserves nothing more.

1 Poverty crushes spirit of weightlifters.

The Losing Battle of Uber-Patriotism

Uber-Patriotism is the phenomenon (as perceived by my limited faculties and partial knowledge and understanding of the term) of over-zealous nationalism and patriotism. Uber, German for super or often over, along with patriotism creates some of the worst kind of excesses, the excesses that created the Hitler’s and the Mussolini’s. Anyway, I am not here to discuss the effects of uber-patriotism in history, or its continued effect on world politics and the Middle East, or even the "war on terror", how the United States has been zombified into believing in things that don’t really exist.

This might be stretching too far into the past, but it certainly is still in touch with the trend that is growing in present day India. Uber-Patriotism is a steadily growing phenomenon in India. The film Industry has certainly caught onto this sense of shallow patriotism and cashed in. The Rang De Basanti’s, Chak De India’s, Lagaan’s, Sivaji’s etc. I could go on. This millennium has certainly seen a lot of bollywood "enthusiasm" into the patriotism genre, raking in the big bucks. But this isn’t about the intentions of the movie makers, however noble/ignoble . Its about how we have allowed ourselves to get caught up in the grip of uber-patriotism.

It was sad, for me, as a starry-eyed, quixotic, almost over-zealous patriot, in my mid-teens to see the lack of any spirit of patriotism in the average indian. The ever-ready question, "Aap kahan ke ho?" (where are you from?), to indicate that you are different from them (and to those that lack the background, I am talking about Indians asking people that are obviously indians). But just when you think it can’t get any worse, it does (though the starry eyed boy is long gone).

The pop-culture of patriotism means you have the indian flag waved around on every damn occasion, more pomp and show on days of national celebration, more movies celebrating the national spirit but at the end of the day, you notice that most of it are just words. Empty, shallow words, that have no actions attached to it, nothing of significance to make you stand and take notice.

Anyway, the rambling must stop, let me get back to what originally got me here, the "stretching into the past" that has forced me to make this post. This was a forward that made it’s rounds a few years back. Perhaps more than a few. The gist for the vast majority that won’t bother reading it is, how the current national anthem is in praise of our colonial rulers and hence does not warrant its place in history and certainly doesn’t warrant being the national anthem. The forward then urged unequivocally, that everyone, "united in breath" ask for it to be replaced by Vande Mataram.

Now let me take this opportunity to dispel any notions that might indicate that I have anything against either of the two songs. Both were born out of the minds of literary geniuses. The point to all this is how easy it was to generate mass hysteria, that we as free indians continue to sing the adulations of our colonial miscreants and in doing so, lower ourselves to our slave status, and hence required the urgency that no other matter deserved. The starving millions, the poor federal reserves (at the time) and the countless other problems faced by the nation were all of secondary importance as we prioritised our need for a national anthem that truly forged in our minds the idea of independence. A hyseteria born out of pure speculation and if the same sources are to be believed as the ones that generate the rumour, then the writer very well knew what he was doing.


But irrespective of the intentions, as sensible indian’s that understand the meaning of the word patriotism, shouldn’t you be more open to interpretation than what the original author intended? Should we dismiss all great literary works because its topical relevance contradicts our belief system? Or should we just take a more rationalistic, non-sensationalistic approach to the whole thing, realise that even if the author wrote the song in praise of our evil over-lords, to the vast majority of a billion indians the song is simply, a song in praise of the motherland?